


Nightmare

by WatermelonTuesdays



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Crying Keith (Voltron), Cuddling & Snuggling, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, He's a worried puppy, Kosmo is there, M/M, Men Crying, Nightmares, but like not scary nightmares
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-01
Updated: 2018-09-01
Packaged: 2019-07-05 05:04:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15856761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WatermelonTuesdays/pseuds/WatermelonTuesdays
Summary: A nightmare sends Keith reeling to find Shiro and make sure he's ok.--------Keith propelled himself through the halls, riding the edge of panic.He had no goal in mind, not in his conscious mind anyway. But when he whipped himself around a corner and saw the closed door to Shiro’s bedroom in the distance he picked up the pace.He didn’t even knock.“Shiro?” His voice was soft, but edged in rough emotion. He suddenly realized he was on the verge of tears, so he swallowed them back, blinking hard to control the emotion.





	Nightmare

**Author's Note:**

> I feel like this is pretty tame stuff. I like to write these short fics to deal with my emotions post-season.
> 
> This one's set in the garrison shortly after they return to Earth, so mid-season 7 sometime. 
> 
> You don't really see the nightmare, this isn't a scary fic.

“SHIRO!”

Keith’s eyes were wide, and stared unseeing into the darkness of his Garrison sleeping quarters. He didn’t know if he had really screamed in his sleep, or if that was what had woken him up. Maybe he had tossed hard enough to wake himself up. Or maybe it was his wolf’s whine, with a heavy paw to his chest.

It didn’t matter.

He was awake now. 

The fears of his dream haunted him, even in waking. 

The edges of the dream were already fading from his memory, but one image was shockingly clear. It was Shiro, but it wasn’t. He was gone, and it was for good this time. Plunged into the darkness of some infinite void.

The worst part was he didn’t fight. He stepped forward, almost relieved, into the inky black.

He hadn’t even turned to Keith’s desperate cries. 

He had just gone.

Keith allowed himself to shake in the dark for about 30 seconds before it became unbearable. 

He wanted the image to fade with the rest of the dream, lost to his subconscious like all the others he’d ever had. But he couldn’t banish the thought. 

And he could do nothing for the cold, black, shard of ice that had settled into his chest. 

Despair.

He was moving and pulling on pants before he really even thought about it. 

Kosmo cocked his head as Keith disappeared in the low lights of the ship’s halls. He whined softly, but stayed in the warm blankets. Even a wolf could tell when Keith needed to be alone.

Keith propelled himself through the halls, riding the edge of panic. 

He had no goal in mind, not in his conscious mind anyway. But when he whipped himself around a corner and saw the closed door to Shiro’s bedroom in the distance he picked up the pace. 

He didn’t even knock.

“Shiro?” His voice was soft, but edged in rough emotion. He suddenly realized he was on the verge of tears, so he swallowed them back, blinking hard to control the emotion.

Shiro was fine.

He could see the faint gleam of white hair from the dim light that passed through the doorway.

Keith turned the lights on to their lowest setting and let the door slid shut behind him with a satisfying hiss. 

He stood over Shiro, eyes drinking in his sleeping form, drinking in the physicality of his presence. Shiro was here. He was here, he was alive, he was safe. Nothing was going to touch him. Nothing.

Keith would see to that.

Shiro grumbled in his sleep. Even now he was waking up, alerted to the new presence in his room. 

“Keith?” His voice was thick with sleep, and it was confused. His eyes squinted blearily at him.

Keith had to touch him. Had to be sure he was there. Feel it for himself. He had to feel the pulse of life.

His hands found Shiro’s arm, his left arm, his flesh arm. He gripped it tightly, then he realized he was being manic – and maybe a little creepy – and he loosened his tight hold.

“Keith, what’s wrong?” Shiro was awake now, and deeply concerned.

“I…” had a dream. But he knew how stupid that sounded. I had a bad dream and needed to touch you to know you’re alive. I was scared you had left me again, and you’re the one thing I can’t handle losing ever again.

Ok, maybe it wasn’t exactly stupid. But it was definitely too much to say.

“…just…” What did he just?

Keith sank to his knees and pressed his forehead to Shiro’s arm too. The skin was warm against his clammy forehead, buzzing with life. “… needed to know you’re ok.”

Shiro blinked. Several times, in fact. But Keith couldn’t see that with his face pressed into the blankets that surrounded Shiro.

“I’m fine, Keith.”

His voice was gentle, and it coaxed those tears back out.

Keith bit his lips closed to keep from crying out, but his deep shuddering breath a moment later gave him away.

“Keith, what’s wrong?” His voice turned softer, gentler, “You can tell me.”

His new arm reached out to touch gently at the top of Keith’s head. 

Keith shuddered at the touch, his next breath shaking his entire body in hard tremors. 

“Hey, shhh… hey, it’s ok. I’m right here.”

Shiro pet Keith’s silky hair, then urged him forward with a steady pressure. Keith leaned forward with the touch and found his face pressed against the fabric of Shiro’s night shirt.

Keith released Shiro’s arm to grab fistfuls of the shirt. He pressed his face hard, staining the soft fabric with his tears. Shiro’s flesh arm pressed a grounding warmth across Keith’s shoulders, while his mechanical arm pet his head, drawing slowly through the thick strands of hair, scratching here and there as if he were petting Kosmo.

“It’s all ok, Keith. Just get it out. I’m here. I’m ok, and I’m not going anywhere. Ok? I’m fine. A little worried about you right now,” Shiro smiled, but kept up a steady string of reassurances, “but I’m ok. And you’re ok. Take your time. I’m here. It’s ok…” and so on and so forth.

Keith’s grief had been utterly overwhelming when it first struck. He clung to Shiro like a lifeline. And Shiro’s words were nothing more than a gentle melody playing in the distance. But as Keith’s tears began to run dry, and as the shame of the situation started prowling around the rational corners of his mind, he focused on Shiro’s words. They were a comfort. They helped him even out his breathing, and calm the stormy turmoil of his mind.

“What happened?” Shiro was infinite patience and kindness. Keith didn’t deserve him, but now that he had him, he was not letting go ever again.

“I had a dream.” Keith laughed shakily at that, and pulled back to sniff and rub his nose along the back of his arm. “I think I ruined your shirt.”

“It’ll wash. What did you dream?”

“I don’t really remember.” Shiro didn’t believe that for a minute, and he would wait indefinitely for the real answer. Keith hung his head. “Well, I don’t remember most of it. But you were there, and there was this darkness, and it was coming for you, and I was yelling at you and… I don’t know. I just woke up in a panic and I had to check on you.”

“Keith,” every time he said the name it was with such softness and understanding that Keith felt a squeeze in his chest. “I’m ok now. I had days in the healing pod. This body has fully accepted me. I’m ok.”

Keith shook his head. That wasn’t it. It wasn’t the fear that Shiro would be taken from him again – not really. It was… it was…

“You wanted to go.”

Shiro looked shocked and confused, but again, Keith couldn’t see it. His head was still hung low, staring at the long fingers that played with the fabric of Shiro’s shirt.

“What?”

“In the dream. You wanted to go. You stepped into the darkness like you wanted it to take you. And I screamed and screamed, but you wouldn’t even look at me. You were leaving, and you wouldn’t say goodbye, and you wouldn’t stop, and you were so relieved to go. You were happy.” The tears stung at his eyes this second time around, and his voice was hoarse from emotion.

His fists shook on Shiro’s chest.

“Keith.” Keith finally turned to look Shiro in the eye. He looked pained, like Keith’s grief hurt him too. His mouth hung like he didn’t know what to say. “Come here.” Strong hands on his back and neck pulled Keith fully onto the bed so that Shiro could cradle him in his arms and press his chin over Keith’s head.

“Shiro…”

“Shhh… Keith. I’m not going anywhere, ok?” It was easier to speak without looking at each other. It was easier for Keith to listen, and understand, with the steady beat of Shiro’s heart against his fingers, and the vibrations of his voice in his chest. It was easier to believe, wrapped up in Shiro’s arms like this. “I’m not going to go anywhere,” he repeated

“Shiro…” Keith took a breath to steady his voice, he had to keep the accusation out of his tone. “You’ve left me so many times now. You’ve died twice. I can’t… I don’t think I can handle you leaving me again. You’re my rock. When you told me you had died, when I thought we were already falling to our deaths… I… I…” There were no words that could describe what Keith had felt then. Or the reverberations he had felt for hours, even days, afterwards. It was months now, and still he felt it. 

Shiro pulled the younger man closer. His face so buried in his hair now that his lips grazed his scalp in not-quite a kiss. 

Keith cleared his throat. “I’m so scared that I’m going to wake up and you’ll be gone again. That someone will hand me your helmet and tell me you were a hero. I know,” Keith took another steadying breath, “that someday you’ll leave me for good, but I’m so scared, Shiro. I’m just so…” 

“Hey, hey, it’s ok. Shhhh…. it’s ok.” Shiro soothed. 

“I’m scared that that’s what you want.”

Shiro’s gasp was a hiss, and his hand stilled against Keith’s long black hair.

“In the healing pod, you wouldn’t connect to your new body. I forced you. I forced you to come back. Allura did it, but it was because of me. And I can’t help thinking that maybe you were happy. Or maybe you were ready. And that’s why you fought the body. I’m scared that you’ll leave, and I’m terrified that I’ve forced you to be here. And that you’d rather be gone to that blackness than stay here with me.”

Shiro was speechless.

How could be possibly find words? Keith’s pain and grief were deep-seated and it was clearly tearing him apart. All the strife Shiro didn’t know the young man was holding ever since his return. 

“I’m so selfish.” Keith’s hands were shaking again.

“You’re not selfish, Keith. Never selfish.”

He reached and pulled one of Keith’s hands from his shirt, lifting it to press against his cheek, letting Keith feel the wet tracks of tears, and the firm line of his jaw.

“You saved me. And you should never feel guilty or selfish for saving me. I wanted to be here, Keith. I want to be here. I fought so hard to stay in this body. Haggar’s mind-wipe, and the fight, it was all too much, the body rejected me. I have never, for a moment, wanted to be anywhere else than here.”

He meant here in the sense of being alive again, back in this world. But also, maybe, he meant here as in literally here, in this bed, holding Keith so tightly they were both feeling a little overheated.

Keith’s tears were softer now. They came in delicate streams down his face, but he kept his breath this time. They were tears of relief now, with a touch of happiness that would only grow as Shiro’s soft assurances further worked themselves into his heart. 

“Thank you, Shiro,” Keith said around a sniffle.

“Anytime.” He nuzzled Keith, his not-quite a kiss feeling distinctly more kiss-like this time.

They lay together for a moment, letting the silence draw around them like a promise. 

“Can I stay here?”

“Of course,” Shiro’s voice was already thickening with sleep. His eyes were heavy.

Shiro edged farther onto the bed so that Keith wasn’t so close to the edge, and Keith shuffled after him, unwilling to lose the comforting warmth.

Shiro smiled and lifted his head to take one good look at Keith before he turned off the dim lights completely. Keith would never show his emotions like this to anyone else; would never admit to any fear or weakness. It was a side that Shiro was deeply privileged to see, and he treasured every rare occasion when it happened.

But this cuddling Keith, who was rapidly falling asleep in Shiro’s arms, this was a new Keith entirely. And privilege didn’t even begin to cover the joy he felt at meeting this new, unguarded man. 

Shiro turned off the lights and drew Keith into a loose hold, breathing in the light spice of his hair.

Sometime in the early hours, Kosmo flashed into the room and made room for himself at the foot of the bed. Keith stirred enough to move his feet out of the way, and swap his pillow for Shiro’s chest. He fell back asleep on the steady rise and fall of Shiro’s breath. 

For the first time in weeks, Keith was content.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks as always for reading!
> 
> You can find me on tumblr as WatermelonTuesdays - not that I post much besides the odd reblog and my new fics. ^.^


End file.
